Work Text:
Resilient. That was the term people used for her. A quick jab to the gut, piercing clean through, but she daren't pull the knife out. She'd learn to work around it, adapt. If there was anything Emily could grit her teeth through, it was this.
"You were always so determined," her father used to muse. "Your first day of kindergarten, you marched straight onto that school bus like it was the beaches of Normandy."
Determined. That was another good one. If he knew how she had still cried the whole way there and back every year until high school, he had never mentioned it. All the better that he didn't; it was something to have all for her own.
Sorting through her father's documents, that familiar pang. In his house, driving his car, raking his leaves. Compress the lesion. Don't bleed out. This time, only dusty photos were privy to her weeping.
Just a few more months, and his case would officially be closed. Sell the house, move away, join a whole family.
She could move on. She was resilient, after all.
All she needed to do was suture the wound.